Author Charles Allen Gramlich and his masterful Midnight in Rosary

 

by Charles Allen Gramlich
Paperback, 252 pages
Published February 13th 2011 by Borgo Press
Review by Dionne Charlet

 

Dr. Charles Allen Gramlich is a seasoned writer, Professor of Experimental Psychology at Xavier University and favorite guest author at science fiction conventions across the Gulf Coast.  Midnight in Rosary is an offering of selections of the author’s poems and short stories newly debuted and previously published over more than two decades of his career.

 

With words like cairn and skein, carapace and mandala, Gramlich grounds a setting, grafting lore within the landscape.  He then exacts characterization with a skill for leaving image and memory of that fictitious being in the mind of the reader.  For example, the evolution of story and persona for the character Kainja seems a testament to intense self reflection, historical research and contemplation of the vampiric state, and this all takes place in excerpts that span a mere 22 pages.

 

Reading Gramlich is exploring fantasy, vampirism, gore and sexual escapade through prose-colored glasses.  Fans of The Matrix Reloaded may remember the Merovingian comparison of cursing in French with an interesting use for silk...

 

There is a disclaimer in the Preface to this publication.  Gramlich advises, “if you don’t like sex in your fiction this collection may not be for you.”  He continues, “The descriptions range from the dramatic to the graphic, although I doubt anyone who has read a Laurell K. Hamilton novel will be shocked."

 

I was shocked, not by the content, but by the sheer beauty this author evokes in the depiction of even the most graphic of images.

 

Then, I was impressed, because there was just so much within that content that delivers new pages of plot twist, romance, insight, and horror from cover to cover.

 

I wanted to devour the words of these poems and short stories.  I read and re-read, each time discovering that something new was waiting there for me to realize, masterfully crafted within descriptions.  Action, image and consequence were exquisitely encased in detail.  I felt the meaning pulled before my eyes like an early curtain call waiting to be revealed later by an encore performance.

 

Professor Gramlich puts more than a footnote right through the idiom ‘those who can’t, teach’.  He is exactly the kind of author who should be teaching, and Midnight in Rosary is the proof.  The only bad news I have is that my review copy is riddled with notes and dogears, highlights and circled passages. The good news is there are years of his work to be read, including Write With Fire:  Thoughts on the Craft of Writing, which is at the top of my personal Must-Have-Books list after reading this collection.